As the Manitowoc Herald described the details of Waldo’s funeral, it went on to state what one speaker said: “‘a man hath but a short time to live. He cometh up, and is cut down, like a flower. He fleeth as it were a shadow.’ No truer words were spoken as Manitowoc’s first son was laid to rest.”

Upon the completion of construction on August 4, 1960, the Edward L. Ryerson set out from Manitowoc for Escanaba, Michigan, where it loaded ore and embarked on its maiden voyage to Indiana Harbor, Indiana.

In Wisconsin, some people say we have two seasons: winter and road construction. Considering that the majority of our interstates were paved under Eisenhower in the 1950’s, it is about time they were updated. Although we complain about the potholes that seemingly form overnight, our roads are nowhere as bumpy and uneven as those of a century ago. Just as the interstate system aimed to connect states and commerce, roads in the 1850s sought to connect communities and commerce. Manitowoc businesses had experienced rapid growth and sought to continue that trend. The next logical step was to draw in additional customers and profit. Building roads that connected customers to the products would ensure continued growth.

We reached a place where we thought we would stay overnight. There was an American living here, who owned an inn and was the postal agent. There was a sign over the door indicating lodging and postal agent … But we could not stay there, the man said, as he had no lanterns. We told him that was not a problem, to which he responded that he also did not have any tea or coffee …

“On August 10, 1855, I came to Manitowoc County with my parents, John Zander and his wife, my brothers, Helmuth and Fred, and my sisters Marie and Caroline, to the town of Gibson, where another brother, Edward, and William Buelkow had already erected a little log cabin on land taken up for us, the only one north of the Green Bay Railroad. Then life in the wilderness began for us.”

“They were out to get us at all costs. From my post in the wheelhouse, there were many close calls form Jap bombs that came hurling down on the carrier from the Jap planes. Two of three times it seemed as if I could almost reach out and touch some of the bombs as they dropped past our station”, recalled Manitowoc’s Edward Aschenbrenner of the sinking of the USS Lexington during World War II. Edward was 24 years old when he was a wheelmen on the U.S. aircraft carrier Lexington when it sank during Battle of the Coral Sea in 1942.

When one thinks of an alligator, you probably picture the Everglades in Florida or an alligator encaged at a zoo. You probably wouldn’t think of coming across an alligator in the wild in Wisconsin. In 1966 however, residents of Clarks Mills were convinced an alligator was among them and just a year later that fear would resurface with reports of another in Door County.

On June 9, 1900, a statue of a soldier standing silently with his gun was placed in the middle of Washington Street in Two Rivers. The day it was positioned there, swarms of people turned out to see it. The complete monument being twenty-one and a half feet high, and the silent metal soldier on top, standing eight feet high, looked southward down Washington Street after being erected.

“Sorry I missed you yesterday. I was busy. Say I’ve been told it’s a good idea to number yours and mine letters so that if one gets lost in the mail we’ll know it. I’ll call this #1. …”

That began the first letter Lieutenant Barry C. Kellenbenz wrote to his wife Karen while serving in Vietnam on January 18, 1969.

“Want to know how we live here – well … if you have time you build a hooch [thatched hut]of ponchos, put your air mattress on the ground and wrap up in your poncho liner (like a thick quilt – pretty warm), put plastic on one end to keep the rain out. And you might carry a light nylon hammock or you wrap up in your poncho liner and poncho and just lie down on the ground…”

Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have died in service of the United States of America. As towns and villages throughout the country join together to remember and honor those who gave the ultimate sacrifice, constant reminders and memorials can be found throughout our area.

The Reedsville Area Veterans Memorial Park brings together the Reedsville AMVETS Post 1032 and the American Legion Gosz-Novak Post 199 to pay tribute to those who have served in the area. A main feature of the park is a T-33A United States Air Force military aircraft.

Construction on the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company’s first World War II submarine, USS Peto, had gone well except for a snag it hit in the latter part of 1942.  In October 1942, a Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company employee was accused of wartime sabotage acts by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for a defect that was found on the USS Peto.

Education has always been an important focus in our county. It was only a year after the first permanent settlers came to Manitowoc from Chicago that our county’s early pioneers began to establish schools for their children. The first school in Manitowoc County was a room in a warehouse on the corner of 6th and Commercial Streets in Manitowoc, owned by Benjamin Jones, a prominent citizen. Soon schools began popping up across townships and by the end of 1850 schools were located in Centerville, Cato, Newton, Rockland, Meeme, Mishicot, and Liberty.

Before the Revolutionary War liberty poles were very popular in town squares. During the war flags on the poles indicated symbols to early colonists.

In the town of Meeme, the first Liberty pole was erected by Nickolas Dittmar, a farmer, in 1852. Nickolas and his wife Caroline.

There’s a life-size picture of a woman, Emily (Kletzien) Underberg, hanging from a trapeze bar inside the Manitowoc County Historical Society’s McAllister House Welcome Center. Emily passed away in 2012 at the age of 96 but her legacy lives on as an inspiration for all who learn her story.

During the outbreak of influenza in 1918, there was a shortage of medical professionals across the nation. The shortage was caused in part by World War I, as many nurses were sent overseas to aid in the war effort. Another cause of shortage were nurses and doctors themselves getting sick. The shortage of medical professionals, specifically nurses, also effected northeastern Wisconsin.

The late 1800s and early 1900s brought the development of many tuberculosis clinics across the United States. Sanatoriums were created as treatment facilities for the growing number of people infected with TB, an infectious bacterial disease that mainly affects the lungs.

The Manitowoc County Board signed a resolution in 1911, marking the start of the Maple Crest Sanatorium, located north of Whitelaw. County Board Supervisor Joseph Willott Jr. called attention to the high number of tuberculosis deaths at the time. A total of 50 deaths were reported from TB in 1910. There were 250 recorded cases of TB in 1911.

Leading the movement for the creation of a TB Sanatorium were prominent local physicians – Dr. Harvey D. Brown, Dr. J.W. Coon and Dr. J.R. Currens. County Judge Chloupek also voiced his support of the project.

As the current Coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic spreads and impacts lives, behavior and livelihoods around the world, readers may not realize it is not the first time a deadly disease has affected local residents.

In the History of Manitowoc County, published in 1912, local historian Dr. Louis Falge chronicles two disastrous cholera epidemics in 1850 and 1854 which affected the lives of early settlers.

With the coronavirus pandemic currently impacting our country, it seemed appropriate to discuss another illness which spread throughout the country and Manitowoc County over one hundred years ago, the Spanish flu or influenza.

Where were you on the night of March 25, 1962? If you were in the city of Manitowoc on that cold spring morning you most likely remember what Fire Chief James Danielson called “the biggest and most spectacular fire ever in Manitowoc.”

It was just around midnight when a fireman looked out a window of the old Franklin Street Station and saw flames coming from Elevator B, formally owned by the Northern Grain Company, which was located four blocks away.

In the spring of 1836, the company of Jones King and Company of Chicago, Illinois sent a group of men to Manitowoc to clear a site for settlement. The company was formed to speculate land in Northeast Wisconsin and soon worked under the name of the Manitowoc Land Company. The group landed in Manitowoc on May 1 on the schooner “Wisconsin”.